Plans in place to keep services going in case of ’flu outbreak

With daily headlines about viruses and vaccines pushing the possibility of a pandemic to the forefront of the public consciousness, the local Community Control Group has plans in place to keep essential services running just in case there ever is an outbreak.
“Obviously, the H1N1 [’flu] has been a huge topic in the media and whole bunch of other different areas, and one of the messages we want to deliver is the fact the community does have a plan in place,” said Fort Frances Fire Chief Gerry Armstrong, who also is the local community emergency management co-ordinator.

“We have done some planning, and we are still working on it,” he noted. “Based on the information we’re receiving, we’re attempting to keep up.
“If it advances, we need to advance, and so on.
“We’re doing everything we can to be as prepared as we can, and hopefully that will suffice in the event that something drastic happen here,” he stressed.
The Community Control Group met last week with Dale Smyk, regional community officer with Emergency Management Ontario, for an emergency management training session on infectious disease control.
The planning exercise was based on the premise: How would the town and all of the essential services continue to function if staffing levels were reduced by 35-50 percent due to an outbreak of an infectious disease?
Armstrong said the session was a tabletop exercise based on a scenario, which included questions that had to be answered by the Community Control Group, which is comprised of representatives from numerous local agencies.
The questions were based on the notion that if a pandemic should happen, and those agencies’ staff and members of the public were affected, how would the agencies respond to that?
“Just because we’re in the emergency services business and so on, we’re certainly not immune to catching the common cold and all those other things,” Chief Armstrong reasoned.
“In an actual disaster, there’s a good chance that people can get to their jobs, that they’re going show up and help out,” he later added. “[But] in a pandemic, they may not be capable of getting to you.
“You’re really looking at having to reduce.
“And certainly in your staffing, you’re going to get people who are afraid to leave their families for the whole protection thing,” he continued. “It has a bit more of a twist to it as far as resources and what may or may not be available.”
The main drive behind the planning was making sure essential services (i.e., policing, fire protection, emergency medical care, water treatment, winter road maintenance, etc.) still could be provided to the community despite a decrease in human resources due to the outbreak.
Citing the water treatment plant as an example, Chief Armstrong noted this is a facility that needs to keep running but needs qualified operators.
“There is a plan in place where operators would be utilized in some fashion,” he said. “It might mean some isolation for specific people, less human contact and those kinds of things.
“And there may have to be utilization of operators from another location or another organization.
“Perhaps there could be operators shared across the district; perhaps the ministry may have to send in operators to assist,” Chief Armstrong explained.
“The bottom line is the plan is there,” he stressed. “We have some back-up, if we should ever need it, for the water treatment plant and so on.”
On the other hand, some non-essential services may be reduced, or even temporarily closed, due to a pandemic.
“Perhaps not everyone would agree with this, but the arena might close. We may not have minor hockey operating at that time,” Chief Armstrong said.
“But you have to understand this isn’t based on a few cases of ’flu, this is based on a pandemic,” he remarked. “The last thing you want to be doing is bringing people together in large assemblies.
“The arena might be one of those, or the theatre at the high school. You may consider cancelling some of those events.”
Plans for every organization that is part of the Community Control Group are similar, said Chief Armstrong, in that they’re based around the idea of managing human resources to keep those services going.
“Probably the simplest way to summarize it is that we really take note of and identify skills, especially within the organization,” he noted.
“Here’s a real simple example: we have three volunteer firefighters that work at Public Works. That may be an opportunity for us in the fire business to utilize those three people that may not otherwise be necessarily needed under the non-essential services part of it with Public Works.
“That’s a real simple, in-house example of what we may consider doing.”
In the case of fire protection, resource sharing between district municipalities would be another alternative, as would getting a hand from the International Fall fire department—although it’s also possible the border could be closed due to the pandemic.
Chief Armstrong stressed the Community Control Group, which is headed by Fort Frances CAO Mark McCaig, includes representatives from numerous groups and organizations, and truly is a collaborative effort.
“We’re basing our plans on information being fed to us from the Northwestern Health Unit and the hospital,” he noted. “We’ve been working in conjunction with those people because obviously the health-care workers and the health unit are going to be affected the greatest.
“We need to know what their capabilities are going to be as we’re doing our preparations, and vice-versa.
“They need to have some idea what we’re doing as far as a community,” he remarked.
Participating groups include the Canadian Red Cross, the district Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) team, Northwestern Health Unit, Riverside Health Care Facilities, Inc., AbitibiBowater, OPP, Treaty #3 Police, CN Police, Ministry of Natural Resources, Rainy River District Social Services Administrative Board (ambulance, social services, and housing), Rainy River District Victim Services Program, Fort Frances Fire and Rescue Service, Union Gas, Fort Frances Power Corp., Town of Fort Frances, and B93•FM.
A similar exercise was conducted in Emo last Wednesday, where various district municipalities got together to plan for such an emergency.
Municipalities are required under the Emergency Management Act and Civil Protection Act to do a specific amount of education and exercise annually, and the most recent one fulfils part of that requirement, said Chief Armstrong.
“But even if it wasn’t a requirement, it’s one of those things that we really need to do anyway to ensure everyone is on board and up to speed,” he noted.
“And periodically, we have player changes, as well, and they need to be kept in the loop and given the opportunity to know what’s going on.”